By Tiernan Ray

Press and analysts and friends and other guests have settled into the massive hanger-like space at Pier 36 on Manhattan's Lower East Side for this morning's unveiling of Research in Motion's (RIMM) unveiling of BB10, its operating system upgrade to the BlackBerry.

The major announcement at the event, aside from the unveiling of new smartphones, was that the company is changing its name from RIM to BlackBerry.

Lights go down, the announcer tells us to see some videos from those watching around the world … Dubai, Toronto (big applause for Toronto), etc.

The announcer comes up in a video with RIM's head of developer relations, Alec Saunders. He talks about traveling the globe in the last year, meeting with developers for BB10 (except for Antarctica; there are no developers there, he says). “There is just this huge wave of support,” says Saunders. “We have put together what is the largest catalog ever of applications for a new platform.” (Read Roger Cheng's excellent profile of Saunders at CNET.)

And it's time for CEO Thorsten Heins to come on stage. “To all of our employees watching around the world, we have definitely been on a journey of transformation.” Taking over a year ago was one of the best opportunities of his life because of the promise he saw in BlackBerry 10, says Heins. BB10 was designed for a certain group of users, those who are “hyper-connected socially,” he says, those who “don't want to go back to a home button for everything they do.”

Heins thanks the team from QNX, the operating system the company bought, former co-CEO James Balsillie, and also former co-CEO Mike Lazaridis, who is sitting in the audience.From today on, says Heins, “we are BlackBerry” says Heins — changing the name of the company! “It all starts today with our renaming and the global launch of BlackBerry 10.”

Heins unveils the Z10 touch-screen BlackBerry and the Q10 with a traditional QWERTY keyboard.

Now it's time for a demo of BB10 functions. Heins brings up Vivek Bhardwaj, RIM, er, BlackBerry's director of its software portfolio.

The BlackBerry “Hub,” which is now very familiar to those who have followed the company's presentation in the last year or so, allows one to groups incoming communications from multiple sources — email, messaging, Facebook — all in one place. The “peek” feature, allows you to swipe with your thumb on the screen to show what's arrived in the hub. “All with just one thumb,” says Heins.

The demo goes into the new onscreen keyboard. It's possible to simply swipe across the keyboard and throw words up onto the screen, rather than actually typing each letter. Again, a feature familiar to those who've been following BB10's development, but it is delightful to see in the demo. “I call this writing without typing!” says Heins.

The demo moves to discussion of “Balance,” which allows one to securely partition the device between personal and corporate applications and data.

Now, BlackBerry Messenger, or BBM. There's some news to announce. “How about if we make the very first public BBM video call?” The chat window yields to a video-conferencing. “This is BlackBerry Flow, seamless transition from the chat to a video call.” Also, screen sharing of the remote individual's BB screen within the video call.

Demo of the camera functions. Just tap anywhere on the screen to shutter release. Refocusing is as easy as drag a finger around the screen to move the cross-hairs. Again, like other functions in BB10, you can jump to taking a photo “with just one thumb” by swiping on the screen.

There's also something called “Story Maker” for assembling your videos into a full clip.

The demo is over and now Heins wants to talk about content alliances. The top film studios and music labels will be making their content available on the BlackBerry World store. BlackBerry's head of business development, Martyn Mallick, comes on stage to talk about developers and apps.

“We are launching BlackBerry 10 with more apps, by far, than any first-generation operating system.” Currently over 70,000 apps developed for BB10. “Yes, we have Skype committed to BlackBerry 10,” also Amazon.com's Kindle, Angry Birds, “we have over 1,000 of those top applications around the world committed to BlackBerry 10.”

The lineup of business and productivity apps is “astounding” he says — Cisco's WebEx, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, etc.

Heins is back. When will they be available? AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, and T-Mobile in the US will announce prices and pre-order info today, but the Z10 is expected in March. It will be available February 5th in Canada, and in the U.K. tomorrow.

Today it isn't just about unveiling new product, says Heins. There's been a lot of speculation leading up to today. The company is engaging with a number of creative entrepreneurs and artists and working moms. The company has created a new position, a “Global Creative Director.” Someone who is a time Grammy award winner, a wife and a mother … Alicia Keys!

Keys comes on stage and talks about how after a long relationship with BlackBerry, she “left you for some other phones I saw at the gym that were a little sexier and had more bling” but now she's glad to come back into a relationship. She goes into an extensive run-down of things she loves about BB10, including the time-shifting feature of the camera. Keys is going to work closely with the carriers, app developers, talk to “other super women who love BlackBerry, a big demographic. It's a big job, a super hands-on role, but I really want to do it.”

And that's a wrap. It's time for everyone to adjourn to the adjoining demo room for some hands-on time. BlackBerry's event continues this afternoon with additional presentations and Q&A.

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There are 9 comments

JANUARY 30, 2013 10:26 A.M.

JT wrote:

Blackberry 10/iPhone 1

JANUARY 30, 2013 10:31 A.M.

Ed wrote:

Everybody go back to bed now. The comedy show is over.

JANUARY 30, 2013 10:35 A.M.

show dont tell wrote:

snoozeville... what a clunky performance. is he selling magazine subscriptions?

rimm is a short

JANUARY 30, 2013 11:06 A.M.

Novelty Act of the Year! wrote:

Oh Boy Oh Boy.

Yeah. I'm so sincere. I always smile and say things like its the best, wow, great, nothing compares...

NOT!

JANUARY 30, 2013 11:32 A.M.

JT Jr. wrote:

Easy JT, did you know the iPhone 1 couldn't even do MMS when it was released?

JANUARY 30, 2013 12:00 P.M.

BQ wrote:

This puts BB back in the light, where they, themselves, turned the switch off some time ago. It's always been a great platform but, without all the bells, whistles, f@rts, and flashing lights, users jumped ship or didn't even bother paying attention.

JT, where BB10 is starting off is miles ahead of a comparative start that the iphone did at its launch.

JANUARY 30, 2013 1:06 P.M.

Anonymous wrote:

Available in the UK tomorrow. Next Tuesday Canada. And the US has to wait till March.

How come one of the models looks like an iPhone?

JANUARY 30, 2013 9:02 P.M.

Rudy wrote:

It's all speculation, you are in it to invest...never mind the SPECULATORS. Short returns will gets you nowhere.

JANUARY 30, 2013 9:18 P.M.

Roger wrote:

Blackberry is back!
Strong commanding presence, functional, specs that match and exceed iPhone 5 and Lumina ... glad I waited as my friends and children waded through the versions (and dollars) of the other bling phones. My backup choice would have been the Galaxy Note ... but now my mind's made up. Blackberry Z10 is the way to go ... and stay! The exciting thing is that they will only get better from here on in. The wait was worth it ...

About Tech Trader Daily

Tech Trader Daily is a blog on technology investing written by Barron’s veteran Tiernan Ray. The blog provides news, analysis and original reporting on events important to investors in software, hardware, the Internet, telecommunications and related fields. Comments and tips can be sent to: techtraderdaily@barrons.com.